Chicken Rider – Nintendo Switch Review

From One Chicken to Another

The long wait is finally over! How did we all manage to get through our everyday lives without this precious highly demanded gem on our Switch? Well, we can all rejoice because Chicken Rider is here. Huh, come again? What do you mean, “What is Chicken Rider?”

Okay, most jokes aside C.R. is an endless runner game brought to us by Ultimate Games. They got away with using the word “Ultimate” very loosely because there is nothing special or even decent about this game in any aspect. I feel I must make it known that I have never been into any endless runner games. I never even played the infamous “Flappy Bird” that took the world by storm back in the day. The genre of game is the opposite of what appeals to me.

Somehow there is a plot according to the creators, but you would not know it at all by just playing the game. The polar bear is an animal activist and while freeing some chickens accidentally falls on an alarm button. Therefore, the bear must ride on a chicken while avoiding obstacles and escape (I feel like a polar bear is faster than a chicken, but let us suspend our sense of reality). That is essentially the game in a nutshell and all provided by the developer. However, after one of my runs came to an end I noticed a Silo in the background. It had a picture of a familiar face from the game and written on it was “JHC Jin’s Happy Chickens”. I found it weird that they decided to put in a plot but leave all the details of the plot on a structure in the background of the second area. I will get back to this topic in a bit though.

The basics of each run is to avoid obstacles that will end your session such as guards and brick walls while collecting coins and power-ups. Some power-ups include a football helmet that gives you an extra hit or a lawnmower that runs across the screen and clears out obstacles. There is a store to spend collected coins to purchase pieces of outfits for the bear to wear, new chicken mounts with different perks, or some consumable upgrades for the next run. The player can only jump and double jump using the A button or either trigger. After only two runs I had to turn off the sound. The menu music is like a cross between “Yankee Doodle” and “The Dueling Banjos” then just cuts out after a few notes then loops. The music while playing is a fine banjo/bluegrass-like music, but nearly every single time you jump you hear an ear-piercing, obnoxiously horrendous “Wooooo” and no, not like Ric Flair does it.

Every 400ish ft/yds you travel, a person on a flying board (exactly like Spiderman’s rival Green Goblin) will appear and shoot a few missiles at you that you try to avoid. If you make it past him then the bear and chicken will run into a new environment. There are no actual levels like the game description claims; it is just one straight run where the scenery changes. This is where I would like to go back to that Silo with “JHC” on it. The guy on the flying board is the guy that is on the silo meaning he is Jin. I feel like that thickens the plot of the game (even though when you double next to nothing it is still next to nothing) and the creators made no effort to inform the players of it. The plot is that the bear is freeing chickens from JHC’s, a clear Kentucky Fried Chicken parody in case you didn’t catch on by now, from being made into food and Jin himself is trying to stop you. Why not just be a bit more descriptive to entice players a bit more? I only accidentally figured the plot and characters out on my own.

From what I gather Ultimate Games is a company from Poland and there seems to be some translation issues to English by them in the game and on websites that detail the game like on Nintendo’s site. Here are some examples:

“Super exciting gameplay”…keep dreaming.

“More than 70th different outfits” 70th??

“…Our heroes will run through Area 51, typical American town and even to the one place that hasn’t been corrupted by capitalism…SPAAAAACE!” Everyone knows what typical American town is…

“…crazy power-ups, among which you will find Squirrel Commando or a typical American redneck!” What is Squirrel Commando and the deal with the typical American stuff?

The lost in translation phrases continue into the game, too. For example, you can purchase “Presidents of Asia Hair” or “King’s of Rock ‘N’ Roll Hair” as an outfit for the bear’s head. There are quite some distasteful outfit choices to buy, too, fortunately for the makers this game will not get enough attention to get any backlash about it.

Final Words:

There are probably a ton of better endless runners that you can download on your phone or tablet for free. Perhaps I am in the wrong about this game though. After all, I am simply just typical American redneck from a typical American town as the creators might say. Originally, I was going to say the game is only four typical American currencies ($4) and could be good to keep one of your kids occupied from time to time, but then I looked at all the outfits that can be bought. The bear can carry a bag of cocaine, dress him up as a pimp, or have him hold “Emo’s razor blade”. So depending on your parenting style, I feel like Ultimate Games threw that last option out the window. I am not offended by this game whatsoever; it just did itself no favours. I cannot believe a company that made such a poor game promotes it so arrogantly with all the typos or poor translation. They could have at least backed up or erased all the translation errors with a good game. If you are a die-hard endless runner gamer that must own every single one that is the only person I can say should get this game. The best feature of the game is the cover art for the game when on the Switch menu because that chicken is dope looking, could use a perm though!